Your Perfect Average Day

Today Has Been Awesome!

Today is my birthday and I have been having an amazing day. Got to wake up and spend time with my kids before they went to school and went to vote with my wife. She then gave me an IPad mini, which is really cool (especially because it is just the right size to use on the panel of my plane).

The day was so gorgeous with clear, deep blue skies and no wind, I just had to go flying. So I did. Went about a third of a way across Texas and still made it back in time for lunch at the bbq joint down the street.

Now, I get to write to all of you and share an awesome exercise that my wife and I went through about a month ago. (Notice how I said that I “get” to. There is a big difference between what we “get” to do and what we’ve “got” to do.)

So, let’s begin.

What is your perfect average day?

Do you know what your perfect average day would be like?

Most people don’t even know what their perfect average day would be like. That’s insane. It’s sounds strange that you wouldn’t know, but how often do you really sit there and think about what a perfect day would be for you. Sure the passing thought about how nice it would be to have the day off to play golf or lay on the couch and watch movies all day comes along on occasion.

But, this wouldn’t be your perfect average day.

Average is the key word here. Playing golf every day would get old fast (maybe not for some people, but it would eventually get old). Laying on the couch every day would also lose it’s relaxing factor.

Also, being that it is your average day, you can’t be thinking of things that will kill you if you did them every day or would be detrimental to your health. So getting drunk every day is out of the question.

We all want to achieve things and work at something. Your perfect average day needs to be all about what you could do most of the time and still find complete happiness.

I want to walk you through this exercise that we found so enlightening. We each did this exercise on our own and then shared what we came up with.

This is not your typical goal setting exercise.

Don’t Focus On Things

The focus should not be on “things”, more on activities and who your with and so on. Don’t focus on just the huge house and expensive car. Those are all things we want on the surface but don’t REALLY make us happy. This is where this differs from normal goal setting exercises and why we found it so fascinating.

Note: you should really write this down when you do it. Also, find a quiet and relaxing place to do this where you won’t have any interruptions. Please take the time. How important is a life of happiness to you?

Wake up.

Start off with waking up. Where are you? Who is with you? What do you see as you open your eyes? Is there a window with a view over looking the beach? What time is it? Do you talk for a while with who you are with? What kind of conversation are you having? What are you talking about?

Do you get up and immediately go for a walk on the beach and talk about your dreams and aspirations or funny things your kids had done recently?

What’s for breakfast?

What do you have for breakfast? What does it smell like and taste like? Where are you having breakfast? Who is with you? Did you cook the food? Is it healthy? What are you talking about while having breakfast?

Is it work or play or work disguised as play?

Where do you go after breakfast? Are you working on something you are passionate about? Where is it? What are you doing? Who are you working with? What sounds are you hearing? What are you smelling? How do you feel?

Lunch time.

This would be the same as breakfast. Who are you with? What are you talking about? Where are you? At a cafe? Eating outside? In a park? At home? With business partners?

After lunch.

Is it back to the office? Is it sitting in a comfortable chair working on goals and dreams? Are you taking a walk with your wife or friends? Do you take a disco nap? Do you head to Starbucks?

Afternoon

Are you still working in the afternoon? What are you working on? Where are you? Are you picking up your kids from school and taking them for ice cream? Are you meeting with a mastermind group and talking over what you’ve done recently and asking advice? Who are you with? What are you talking about?

Dinner

What time are you eating dinner? Where are you? What does it smell like? Is the sun setting? Who are you with?

Evening

What you are doing after dinner? Do you meet with friends and enjoy a drink? Who are you with? What are you talking about? Are you on the couch with your family watching a movie? Are you playing board games with your kids? Are you working on a hobby? What time are you going to bed? What is the bed like? What is the conversation about?

You can see the process here. Just be really honest with yourself. It’s amazing how we can realize that “things” are not what we are really after. There are some things that will make the average day perfect, but it’s more about who we are with and the freedom to do those things.

Are You Working Toward This Perfect Day?

Some of what you’ve thought about you can start doing now. You don’t need to make a million dollars first.

As Jim Rohn said, “Don’t make a million dollars to make a million dollars, make it for the kind of person you have to become to make a million dollars.”

Start being that person. Start living your life as close as you can to this perfect average day. Have it be a part of who you are and the reason why you are working hard. Let it be part of your goals.

Keep it in your mind as you decide to take on new things and just make sure that what you are doing is going to get you close to this perfect average day.

You Could Be Missing Out

If you haven’t yet subscribed, you are missing out. Subscribers are getting so much more. I’ve started sending out more about our own journey of getting started in this business and things that we’ve learned along the way. I feel this information is better shared by email than on the blog as it is more of a dialogue with me.

For a long time I was really hesitant to give anyone my email address. Never really considered what would happen, I just immediately felt hesitant to do it and never did. Then I went out on a limb and just did it (don’t remember the site) and found that there was nothing to be afraid of. I received a lot of great info and could easily unsubscribe through a link on each email that was sent to me.

It was also surprising that I didn’t immediately get a flood of 100 emails (maybe this happened in the wild west of the early internet but does not now with all of the anti-spam laws), just good quality content. Now I’m not afraid to give my email address to people that blog and provide good content. Still hesitant to give to business websites that are not associated with a single person.

What I’m saying is to just give it a chance. Simply subscribe at the top right of the page or at the top of the main page and give me a chance to show you how much there is to gain by it. Current subscribers know what I’m talking about.

Danny, great post, thanks for it. I met a guy (also named Brooks) that was a solid go-getter. He said he had a paper written regarding his perfect day (more like a dissertation considering he said it was 16 pgs) I had written goals visually all the time, but never got really detailed on visualizing my day. But you two have changed me on this. And for this I thank you!

No problem. This exercise really was an eye opener for us and I’m glad to be able to share it with you. Man, 16 pages! That must have been very detailed! Mine is 2 pages (small front and closely spaced). It really is cool to consider goals that go beyond “things”.

Great post. It’s funny, when I started thinking about my perfect life and goals I almost never think about the “thing” goals. You’re absolutely right…that Volvo C70 convertible ain’t gonna make me happy (ok ok, I still want it)

I had done an exercise recently where I closed my eyes and looked at the big picture and what I wanted my future to look like and it really surprised me that the things I envisioned weren’t objects. Going into the exercise, I figured that the tangible things that I strive for would be what I would see. But they weren’t.

Just like to spend some time on the aspects of life that are more rewarding. But hey, I still want a lot of stuff as well. Makes it fun to set a goal for a thing and to actually be able to go and get it one day.